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Jackson County Meeting to Begin New Plan for Bed Tax
02/08/10 - 04:27 PM

Jackson County Floridan

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Those with an interest in the future of tourism and the use of bed tax revenues in Jackson County may want to make Friday, March 12, a red-letter day on their calendars.

A planning workshop on those subjects is scheduled immediately after the Jackson County Chamber of Commerce First Friday breakfast.

It will be held at the agriculture center on Penn Avenue, and is a joint session of the Jackson County Commission and the county Tourist Development Council. The chamber administers TDC funds generated by the bed tax, and has facilitated a few previous meetings related to the tax and its purpose.

Chamber President Art Kimbrough said rules of the bed tax require the community to develop an updated spending strategy every 10 years. A new plan is due this year.

The chamber’s breakfast meeting before the joint session will also be devoted to the subject of tourism, and the guest speaker will stay to help facilitate the second meeting.

Kimbrough said Judy Randal is “considered a premiere expert around the country on rural tourism,” and helped create the model for Riverway South, a public-private partnership seeking to increase recreational and tourism opportunities on the Apalachicola, Chattahoochee and Flint river system.

Kimbrough snagged Randal for the meeting when he found out she was already going to be in the area to facilitate a Riverway South workshop in Apalachicola.

The breakfast meeting gets under way around 7 a.m., and the workshop is set to begin around 9 a.m. It should last until just before 11 a.m. and is open to the public.

Joining Randal as facilitator will be Tom Waits, who helped craft the bed tax legislation. Carol Rutland of Riverway South is also expected to attend.

Kimbrough said he envisions a 10-year bed tax plan that will be more comprehensive, and far-reaching than the one now set to expire.

The bed tax stands at 4 cents on the dollar. Half the money is currently being set aside for the development of a conference center or similar venue. As a tourism engine, many advocates of such a building see it as a place that would be attractive to large organizations, which could hold multiple-day seminars here.

By filling up hotel rooms,  supporters say, the conference center would also likely generate business for local restaurants and other businesses, as visitors find ways to spend their free time.

Typically, events are funded with the remainder of the TDC money on a case-by-case basis. If event organizers can show a potential to fill hotel rooms and meet certain other criteria, events are usually funded at some level.

Kimbrough said he thinks the revised plan will have a more proactive approach about spending this half of the TDC money, aiming it toward specific, measurable tourism goals.

“We’re engaging in these continuing education and tourism sessions together, so that we can come to a common understanding about how the dollars can best be used to increase tourism activity in Jackson County,” Kimbrough said.

“Eventually, we’ll end up with a a revised strategic plan in which we have a more holistic decision-making process, that allows us to proactively allocate and invest those dollars in marketing, certain events, and in other ways that make the best use of the money.”

Part of that will likely mean more focused ad campaigns.

“I think we’ll begin to see a more common thread of directed marketing, rather than ad hoc responding to opportunities that happen to cross the radar screen,” Kimbrough continued. “ For most of the first 10 years, it has been more or less like that, but I think that going forward we’re going to have to have a more organized approach toward planned results that we agree we want to achieve. These workshops are helping us work out the goals and the strategies.”